Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Beautiful Women, Dangerous Minds

Brace yourselves, folks – there’s a couple of new offerings coming your way via the fiendish minds of the uber-glam ladies of Irish crime fiction. First up is UNDERTOW, Arlene Hunt’s follow-up to MISSING PRESUMED DEAD, with the blurb elves wittering thusly:
A missing boyfriend … a heavily pregnant girlfriend … just another ordinary case for QuicK Investigations. But the trail they follow suggests something far from ordinary. Who is Orie Kavlar and why has he gone to ground? What is the connection to the body of a dead girl found on waste ground in Sandyford? And what is his relationship to Darren Wallace, ex-gangland criminal? With their personal relationship at a new all-time low, Sarah and John are straining under the weight of their own problems, such as the murder of Sarah’s ex-boyfriend Vic. Vic was a dangerous psychotic, but murder is murder. So why won’t she accept John’s help? In no time John and Sarah’s investigations alert others to their search, and as they dig deeper into Orie Kavlar’s life, one man decides he has too much to lose to allow them to continue. Sarah and John are about to be caught up in an undertow of violence that will suck them into their most perilous case yet.
  Nice. Meanwhile, BLOOD RUNS COLD, Alex Barclay’s third novel, arrives on December 1st. Quoth the blurb elves:
Kidnap and murder collide in Alex Barclay’s heart-stopping new thriller featuring FBI Agent Ren Bryce. When an FBI agent is found dead on the white slopes of Quandary Peak in Colorado, a brilliant but volatile agent is drafted in from Denver to lead the investigation. Fighting personal demons, pressure from Washington and dwindling leads, the case stalls and a career falters. But as summer comes, Quandary Peak has disturbing new secrets to give up. And as one agent fights failure and hopelessness, another has left behind a trail that leads to a man with a dark past and even darker intentions.
  So there you have it. Beautiful women, dangerous minds. No wonder we like this crime fiction malarkey …

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Declan Burke has published a number of novels, the most recent of which is ABSOLUTE ZERO COOL. As a journalist and critic, he writes and broadcasts on books and film for a variety of media outlets, including the Irish Times, RTE, the Irish Examiner and the Sunday Independent. He has an unfortunate habit of speaking about himself in the third person. All views expressed here are his own and are very likely to be contrary.